Contemporary politics, local and international current affairs, science and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
Truth never damages a cause that is just ~ MAHATMA GANDHI

Wednesday, 12 July 2017

Al Gore: Australian government subsidising coal power would be ‘crazy’

Any move by the Australian government to subsidise coal-fired power
would be “crazy” and providing funding for infrastructure to support the
Adani coal mine is “just nuts,” former US vice president and climate
change campaigner Al Gore has said.
“Globally, the world is moving rapidly away from subsidies to fossil
fuels,” he said. “It would be odd if Australia went in the opposite
direction and subsidised coal. It’s impolitic of me to say it, but it
would be crazy.”
The Adani Group’s proposed $16bn Carmichael coal mine in Queensland’s Galilee Basin,
which is yet to get finance but has been promised $1bn from the
Australian government to build a rail line to port, was particularly
unwise, Gore said.

“The Adani mine doesn’t have its financing, I hope it never gets its
financing,” he said. “It’s not my place to meddle with your politics,
but truly, this is nuts.”
Gore made the comments at the end of a presentation to the Investor Group on Climate Change, in a Q&A with Guardian Australia editor Lenore Taylor.

Without policy levers in favour of coal, Gore said the declining cost
of both renewable energy and battery storage made it “now the dominant
reality in energy markets”.
“Most people assume that the coal industry is in a terminal decline,”
he said. “The market capitalisation of the global coal industry has
declined … I think the figure is almost 90% in the last seven our eight
years. It’s quite dramatic. The world is turning away from coal.”
Federal policy leadership was helpful and would provide additional
certainty for investors, but it was not necessary, he said. Earlier,
Gore said the United States was working towards its Paris Agreement
targets through actions taken at a state and local level, despite US
President Donald Trump opting out.
“And if there’s another president elected, please God ... the new president within 30 days can come back in,” he said.

Gore said he will encourage Australian premiers and chief ministers
to make similar commitments at a meeting in Melbourne on Thursday,
before the Council of Australian Governments energy meeting on Friday.
“As in the US, here in Australia many of the most important levers
are in the hands of the state premiers and mayors. I think they do,
particularly if they act together … have the ability to create much more
certainty for investors.”
Examples of that commitment could include a renewable energy target,
such as the Victorian government’s commitment to generating 40% of its
electricity by renewables by 2025, or an emissions reduction target,
such as Queensland’s announcement on Tuesday of a zero net emissions target by 2050.
“If Queensland can do it then any state in Australia can,” Gore said.

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About Me

I was inspired to start this when I discovered old editions of "The Worker". "The Worker" was first published in March 1890, it was the Journal of the Associated Workers of Queensland. It was a Political Newspaper for the Labour Movement. The first Editor was William "Billy" Lane who strongly supported the iconic Shearers' Strike in 1891. He planted the seed of New Unionism in Queensland with the motto “that men should organise for the good they can do and not the benefits they hope to obtain,” he also started a Socialist colony in Paraguay.
Because of the right-wing bias in some sections of the Australian media, I feel compelled to counter their negative and one-sided version of events.
The disgraceful conduct of the Murdoch owned Newspapers in the 2013 Federal Election towards the Labor Party shows how unrepresentative some of the Australian media has become.